A VC - Latest Comments in Give Bing A Chance

Re: Give Bing A Chance

RichardF — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 06:50:40 -0000

Hey Fred looks like Microsoft are serious about buying Twitter then! ... there seems to be a big enough budget http://www.businessinsider....

Re: Give Bing A Chance

ShanaC — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:01:39 -0000

The two questions I have:

A) Will it support CS4 and 64 bit versions of Maya and other stuff out of Autodesk-land?

b) if yes, The arts industry moved to Final Cut Pro( Especially after Apply took Avid's designer). Apple, rumor has it, is about to release a lightweight version (if they haven't already) for newsroom use. Is it worth it to try and illegally do a dual boot?

I need to invest in a computer for my BA. Best setup? I'm tired of crashing...

Re: Give Bing A Chance

jd — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 12:40:49 -0000

That's illuminating but keep in mind it is not core search but Shopping search which typically relies heavily on feeds. I'm a bit surprised Microsoft didn't have that in place for launch.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 08:15:13 -0000

Wow

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 08:07:24 -0000

Great comment. Love the examples!!!

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Mark Essel — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 07:48:13 -0000

Sharp perspective Aaron. Will give win7 a try now. Each replacement of windows systems dictates a complex trail of software that will need to be recreated in a web environment. Reliable VM/emulation will definitely speed up any change acceptance. The cost analysis will dictate the move away from windows, including all the time and software replacement needs.

New businesses will have a better chance of starting out without windows reliance, and finding solutions outside of windows from the get go.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 07:21:07 -0000

Touche

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 07:15:12 -0000

Google is more supportive of user gen and real time content for sure

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 07:04:12 -0000

I've basically moved off the OS and now use firefox almost exclusively as the only open desktop app

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 07:02:11 -0000

That makes sense to me. But I don't know why they wouldn't leverage both sales forces and many others too

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Ryan Anderson — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:58:16 -0000

Stumbled upon my first reason to try Bing out today, worked surprisingly well: http://bit.ly/V79MA

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Aaron Klein — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 04:08:57 -0000

Google has an OS in Android, and a web apps engine in Chrome, so without a doubt they have the capability. The question is...can put they put all of the other pieces and platforms together to make it switchable for the average person?

They need a simple, easy-to-run virtual machine running Windows. As simple as, I put in my Windows XP key and the Windows app opens inside of an Android window, and I don't even realize it's a Windows app any more.

If that happens -- and the Google Docs stuff gets way better -- they have a shot. But right now, the desktop is not the phone. A lack of apps is not going to stop the Pre from a strong launch. A lack of apps will definitely stop an OS.

Why isn't the Mac a serious competitor to Windows? I have to be honest and say that they've almost got me. Now that Snow Leopard supports Exchange Server, that may be one of the last remaining obstacles. I'm waiting for it to come out and then I'll visit the Apple Store and play with it for a while.

Yep, Windows 7 is rocking. Been on it for about 6 weeks now. Very stable, beautiful interface, boots faster than my BlackBerry, no kidding. Vista should have been called Windows 7 Beta, but it doesn't deserve the "7" name. :)

Re: Give Bing A Chance

marshal sandler — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 03:00:36 -0000

http://www.bing.com/search?... Adaptive Blue Search Using Bing On Latest Version Safari set Bing Up on Safari Using Gimp

Re: Give Bing A Chance

marshal sandler — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 02:53:40 -0000

I set up Bing on My Latest Version of Safari using Gimp did a search on Seth Godin I think the results are pretty impressive http://www.bing.com/search?...

Re: Give Bing A Chance

AAfter Search — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 20:12:42 -0000

Even Google has challenge to promote Google check out, Google answer and so on.. It is hard to break the habits even with better products.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Paulhwa Lee — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 19:09:43 -0000

Agreed. I am another supporter of the notion that Bing may not be trying to compete with Google. It seems that user intent may be quite difficult to determine in many instances. For example, someone more familiar with linux would prefer more technical search results with the search term "linux" compared to the average Joe or Jane.

I guess a question is whether a search engine can truly be all things to all people. Perhaps Microsoft's determination of user intent simplifies down to which search results would be more meaningful to the greatest number of people to maximize ad revenue within the most profitable target market.

I'm also have been trying out Bing. The images and video are great...some searches work...some searches don't. but maybe my experiment will only ultimately lead me to conclude that I'm am or am not in Microsoft's target market. Like many new products, I often think "gosh I would never use or buy that". But then they're not trying to sell those things to me in the first place.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Aaron Klein — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:58:18 -0000

I think it's actually Android, and Chrome is the app engine.

Windows 7 actually rocks. I've been running it for several months now. Light years ahead of Vista or XP. Lots of cool useful stuff. Frankly, it leapfrogged the Mac in some areas and Apple is now playing catchup.

That being said, web apps are quickly commoditizing the OS. But I predict it will be years before a Google OS could be really viable.

Here's an example: there's a CS department at a company I work with. Ten reps, all running Windows XP systems. No complicated apps like Photoshop where you really need native code running. It would save the company a lot of time and hassle to simplify and go to Android.

But even then, there are some major issues. All these reps use Yahoo Messenger to communicate. Can't get that on Android yet. There's a web version, but it's not as good and needs Flash. Last I checked, Android can't run Flash.

They also run proprietary Avaya VOIP software that manages the call distribution so they can see their queues and calls holding. Perhaps the company has a web version, but they might not.

So suffice it to say, it's great to talk about a new OS, but there are a lot of protocols and platforms a new OS needs to support, and even then, there will be cases where you can't get away from Windows or at least virtual machine/emulation.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

ShanaC — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:49:36 -0000

If Google can successfully develop a 64 bit OS that runs seamlessly with 32 bit drivers, they have a killer app for a lot of niche fields. Or Apple, just anyone who can support graphics.

Apple has a great OS, but it is not 64 bits. At the end of the day, any professional field that relies on image rendering (and there are more popping up every day) will need a machine with an OS that is 64 bits to use up a hell of lot of memory.

Only from experience. I crash Illustrator CS3 regularly on fairly currents DualCore Apples with excessive memory, due to importing huge text files. And my problems are not atypical.

I have a friend having the same problems with Older versions of Maya. High rendering quality is out of the question- it crashes.

Such a waste of time too.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Aaron Klein — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:32:37 -0000

What's inexplicable about Apple building closed platforms? ;)

Agree with your take.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Aaron Klein — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:31:03 -0000

The rumor I heard was that it might be MSFT sales force, Yahoo monetization platform and Bing search engine.

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 12:27:22 -0000

Isn't chrome goog's os?

Re: Give Bing A Chance

fredwilson — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 12:26:23 -0000

Good idea. I've tried opera a few times but I'll give this new version a try

Re: Give Bing A Chance

Kevin Chan — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 06:30:06 -0000

I don't think that Bing was made to take over Google in the first place. I know this has been mentioned quite a fair bit, and I've used Bing and still I am not inclined to use it further. Yes, the images are better but the only reason I use a search engine is to look for something.

I've even used Google Squared, and I am more impressed with that than Bing, even though it is primarily not a search engine but it is used to narrow down your searches more.

Another thing that has made me excited would be Opera. It released a new version today, and so far I have used the file sharing, music library, note services and it has been impressive! How about giving that a chance?

Re: Give Bing A Chance

ShanaC — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 02:15:32 -0000

Still can't claim..any word on why yet? I've switched OSes...though I am still using Firefox...

Re: Give Bing A Chance

ShanaC — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 02:13:24 -0000

What I am thinking so far from a cursory look

It has a beautiful CSS. May more people give up the bubble look and copy Bing. (God do I hate that bubble look).

I'm unsure of the past history feature. One one hand- great to know what my random mind is thinking. On the other hand, I am not sure I would want that sort of feature on a publicly accessible computer, or a computer located in certain countries. (Say a public computer cafe in Iran this weekend, would you really want a list of past searches right there?)

The one thing I hate is a lack of a smart spell-check/dictionary/thesaurus in the search function. I often use Google as my dictionary, and it helps that I know I do not spell many words well. Having Google double check for me, or even double check the meaning of a word, annoys me to no end.

(Nothing like being home after finals)